


Sweet as Freedom

by Mithen



Category: Star Wars: The Old Republic
Genre: Backstory, F/M, Memories, Nightmares, Slavery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-02
Updated: 2013-11-02
Packaged: 2017-12-31 05:31:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1027793
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mithen/pseuds/Mithen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She is Darth Nox now:  powerful and respected.  But at night, she can no longer tell her dreams apart from the ghosts that haunt her mind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sweet as Freedom

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Selkit](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Selkit/gifts).



The air smells close and heavy. Myrrh and incense, with something rotting underneath.

No windows, no doors. The walls are lined with shelves of jars, crouching black and glossy as beasts in the dim light. She must get inside them, but her fingers slip across their slick surfaces, finding no purchase.

Finally, with a cry of rage, she summons the power at the wellspring of her soul. Violet lightning crackles and the jars burst asunder simultaneously, spilling a clattering flood of gems and jewels into the room that rises to her ankles.

( _Wake up,_ calls a familiar voice. _Wake up, Azulan!)_ But it is far away and faint and drowned out by the dancing, precious cascade)

So many, so many...and yet which are truly _hers_? She finds herself on her hands and knees, searching madly for the right ones. Some uncurl like centipedes between her fingers ( _\--dabbles his fingers in the blood, licks them clean, laughing--_ ); some give way sickeningly like rotten fruit ( _\--his mother's eyes full of pride and awe, gazing at her son triumphant--_ ), and she feels despair slither through her vitals. She will never find them, they are gone forever, she will die here in the dark alone, losing all that she was--

No.

She takes a deep breath, composes herself. Finds the core of her anger and fear and lets it lift her from her knees. She feels the power flare within her, igniting her eyes.

 _There._ In one of the myriad gems, an echo of incandescence. She seizes it with shaking hands and knows that this one is truly hers.

Carefully, patiently, she re-assembles her memories through the night like a necklace of black pearls.

* * *

Her parents' eyes are flat and dry as stones as they finish haggling the details of her sale with the robed man. They had ten children at the beginning at the day; at the end they will have only nine hungry mouths to feed, and more money to do so.

"You say she's clever?" the man says, gazing down at her.

She is ten years old; she lifts her chin and looks back at him.

"Not _too_ clever, my Lord," says her father.

"Not at all," echoes her mother.

The man gives them a long, contemptuous look, then turns to speak to her as if they no longer exist. "I am Birq, the overseer of Lord Chancra's household. I obey her in all things, and you shall obey me in all things. Is that understood?"

She nods, still meeting his eyes, and he cuffs the side of her face, sharp and sudden.

Her parents do not move.

"A slave does not meet the eyes of her betters," he says.

She drops her eyes and her hatred is a small hot knot in her stomach as she murmurs "I understand, my lord."

He chuckles. "I am no lord. You may simply call me Overseer." But she can tell he is pleased by her mistake, and she stores that knowledge away.

"I understand, Overseer."

"Come with me."

Azulan falls in beside him and does not look back at her parents, lets the memory of their cold dark eyes drop into silence and darkness and does not think of them again.

* * *

 

She is grinding seeds for Lord Chancra's latest concoction; the azure ovals rattle in the mortar, releasing a pungent dust as she pulverises them with the pestle. When they are a fine powder, she knocks politely at her Lord's workshop door and waits for the lazy, amused drawl to call "Enter."

She walks in with her head bowed, her eyes on the black marble tiles. In three years she has never lifted them to see the Sith Lord's face.

Chancra likes her for her silence, her humility, her diligence: gives her errands to run, lets her clean the workshop after the day's experiments are over.

It is in this workshop that she begins to learn what power is, and to realize that she has it.

For she does not need to raise her eyes to feel the aura around her master, an incandescent indigo haze that tastes like ozone and violets at the back of her throat. It gutters and flickers around the Lord like a flame, burning sometimes clear and bright, sometimes turbid and low.

She realizes soon enough that Lord Chancra cannot sense when she siphons off wisps of that power, drawing them into herself like inhaling fragrant smoke. She yearns for more, for the giddy rush of power that she knows she could seize for her own, but the time is not right, she is not ready.

She binds her hunger and desire with iron bands and lets them burn in her heart, unslaked and unseen.

"Your powdered _arxra_ , my Lord," she murmurs.

Lord Chancra takes the mortar from her, sniffs at it, hands it back. "Grind it more finely," she says. Unlike Overseer Birq, Chancra never strikes her: she is beneath notice, not worth the malice.

As the pestle grates in the mortar, Chancra throws herself into her chair and sighs. "Curse Lord Ghaerrro anyway," she says, trilling the "r"s effortlessly. "The rat bastard. He thinks he's got me cornered, but I've still got a few tricks up my sleeve, a few favors I can call in." She takes the proffered _arxra_ and waves it under her nose. "Good enough," she says. As the Lord rises from her chair once more she pats Azulan on the head, absently. "Life must be so simple for you, child. Sometimes I nearly envy you."

She lets energy flow into her from her master's careless touch, sips its redolent richness. _Someday you shall envy me in earnest,_ she thinks. _And then I shall consume you and forget you utterly._

* * *

 

Lord Chancra takes her along to Ciutric IV, to fetch and carry while she has some important meeting with some important person--she doesn't say whom, and Azulan doesn't care. She has never traveled with Chancra, and has certainly never seen a world like this, all blazing silver and glass. A neutral world, where Empire and Republic citizens can both go freely.

"You want me to go out there alone, my Lord?" She lets her voice tremble, allows Chancra to see her fear, but carefully hides away her greedy exhilaration.

"I only brought along three of you," Chancra says, "And you've been with me the longest." She smiles absently, looking through her. "Do well and who knows? Perhaps one day you can be my household Overseer instead of Birq." She laughs at the thought; Azulan does not join in--Chancra does not laugh with her slaves.

Besides, she has much higher ambitions than a mere supervisor of slaves.

She looks at the list Chancra hands her, then at the scrap of mist-white cloth and silver ribbon. "What is this, my Lord?"

"Slaves are required to go veiled in public here," Chancra says, waving a hand. "Not worth the hassle of having to come fetch you from prison if you're detained."

Indeed, she suspects Chancra would probably just leave her there, so she ties the veil into place without demur.

Soon she is on her way back from the market with alcohol, fruit, and some kind of iridescent powder. She finds herself glad for the veil which hides her face, so no one can see her gawping like some yokel at the shining spires reaching into the rosy sky. She has haggled down the price of the alcohol and has a handful of local coins left; she is turning them over in her hand when she sees the sweets shop on the corner.

The man behind the counter raises an eyebrow at her veil, but takes her money and hands her a small bag of sweets: bright red spheres like the kind she had craved as a child. She puts one in her mouth and closes her eyes at the sweet-sour rush of taste.

When she opens them again, she is surrounded by a group of teens. Some are slightly older than her, a few quite younger. None of them looks friendly.

"Hand over the _jzii_ and we won't have to hurt you," says the leader of the little gang, pointing to the bottle of alcohol poking out of her bag.

"We won't _have_ to. But we might _want_ to," says his second-in-command, tapping his hand with a crude blackjack.

There's a giggle behind her, and a rough hand slaps the bag of candy from her grip. It rips open and the scarlet spheres bounce on the pavement, skittering; the gang leader steps on one and grinds it to powder under his foot.

There are six of them, and no one will stop to help an offworlder slave, she knows that. She should be afraid, and perhaps she is. But the fear is nothing compared to the anger she feels kindling in her belly, a rush of pure indigo fury that blurs her vision. It thunders in her ears, demanding release, and she knows with utter surety that she could turn their bones to ash, melt their skin from their bodies. She lifts her hands--

"Get out of here, you!" The voice is rough with anger; the gang leader is picked up unceremoniously by the collar and trouser seat and tossed sprawling into a refuse bin. "Bunch of bullies--that's right, not so tough when you're facing someone your own size, are you?"

Her tormentors edge away from the newcomer, then scatter and are gone.

"Are you all right?" Her vision is still blurry with power; she blinks and the violet haze frays away to reveal a Republic insignia on an armored chest. She looks up through the mist of the veil into the face of a young soldier, only a few years older than herself. He looks worried. "Did they hurt you?"

"I didn't need your help," she snaps--but it comes out a shaking thread of sound and she leans against the wall, struggling to get herself back under control.

"Of course not," he said, and his voice is amused; but why should it not be, all he has seen is a slave girl tormented and helpless. "Let me carry those," he says, "Wouldn't want you to smash up the _jzii_ after all that."

As he lifts the bags from her she can see why he is concerned, for her hands are shaking as if palsied, trembling with power thwarted. She clenches them against the ache. He stands with her bags, waiting politely for her to compose herself, and she looks down at her hands and remembers how it felt to be ready to annihilate those who would hurt her.

After a moment, she says more quietly, "Thank you. For saving me." For he has, albeit not in the way he thinks. It's too early to reveal her true self. She needs more time to gather power, and a slave girl electrocuting five people is not going to go unnoticed. The rush of energy has abandoned her, and she feels cold and sick as she realizes what she has risked. On a neutral world, away from the power of the Sith, a slave who killed free people would come to beg for a quick death.

Her savior chuckles. "I'll probably get chewed out for it by the Captain. He's got a stick up his--" He breaks off and clears his throat, "--up his nether regions about interfering with local affairs." She can't help but laugh at his careful choice of words, and he grins with delight at the sound. "But he can go throw himself in a sarlacc pit for all I care. Hate to see people getting ganged up on. Where are you headed?"

"The spaceport. My--" But she chokes on the word "master," says instead, "I'm only here for a few days."

"Lucky you," he says. "I've been here two weeks and I'm ready to head out anytime."

"Really? Is it so bad here?"

He shrugs. "Oh, it's all bullies and thugs, from the street gangs up to the prime minister. I guess just about everyplace is, really."

She can't argue with that.

They fall into step together, walking toward the spaceport. He doesn't seem to expect that she will walk a pace behind him as is proper for slaves walking with free people, so they walk side by side. He talks as they go: about his fellow soldiers, his impressions of Ciutric IV, the particular discomfort of a _jzii_ hangover. He asks her little about her own life, and for that she is grateful. She asks questions, laughs when he says something funny. One time she pokes him in the ribs without thinking when he makes a bad pun, the way she would have nudged her younger brother. He laughs and mock-apologizes, goes back to describing his favorite street food on Tatooine, some kind of lizard on a stick. Just the kind of meaningless small talk you would make with a stranger you met on the street and walked with for a time.

When they reach the spaceport, he sees her to the hangar door. "Well," he says. "It's been a pleasure passing some time with you, miss." The corner of his mouth crooks in a smile, and he bows slightly.

Unsure what to do, what to say, she says again, "Thank you," and sticks her hand out for him to shake as if they were equals.

He takes it gravely in his gloved hand; she feels the pressure of his grip, the warmth of him through the cloth. Then he lifts it to his lips briefly, an almost courtly gesture. "Fare well," he says, and then is gone.

That night Chancra drinks herself into a stupor on _jzii_ and Azulan draws power from her greedily, recklessly, until she is giddy with the sweetness of it.

She dreams that night of shattering bonds, of soaring between the stars. Of the power to remake the world as it should be, with herself at the center.

* * *

 

The nightmare will never end; her hands shake as she gathers each memory of triumph and pain and holds them close. So much she has always yearned to forget, and now scrambles to recover. The dark walls are collapsing, and the room is filling with gems that are not hers, pressing against her, crushing her, annihilating--

A voice is calling her name, someone is shaking her, and she summons power like a lash, ready to strike out when she realizes that she is in her own room, on her ship ( _her_ ship) and Andronikos is holding her.

She feels herself shaking and lets him pull her close, hold her head against his chest. He is whispering her name, calling her by fond and foolish endearments. If anyone were to call her such things in public she would have their tongue out with red-hot pincers.

In her room, in the dark that veils her face, she lets herself relax against him, lets the words wash over her. She breathes in the cheap cologne that he likes to wear despite her complaints, reaches up to caress the stubble on his cheek. Its very roughness seems to steady her.

"Nightmare?" he says after a time, when the worst of her trembling has passed.

Now she can prop herself up, elbows on his chest, and smile at him. "The usual. Nothing I haven't learned to live with."

He cups her face in his hands, gazing at her. She looks back into the only eyes that ever truly saw her, at the only person who ever treated her as an equal. She does not know if he ever has recognized in his dread and beloved Sith Lord the slave girl from so long ago, and she will never ask.

But for her birthday, the first one after they met, he gave her a bag of scarlet candy. They ate them together in bed, feeding each other with their bodies entwined.

Their kisses tasted as sweet as power, as sweet as freedom.


End file.
